Jeb’s Effeteness and His Downfall: He Was Truly Unprepared for the Job

Bush Gun TweetThe gun told us it was over. Or perhaps it was even before that when he said “please clap!” Or perhaps with these other faux pas. Maybe it was when he thought the people would elect a guy name “Jeb” who had no last name.

Who names a kid Jeb? I wrote a novel a long time ago and that was the name I used for the protagonist. I never thought anyone actually had that name until I heard of Jeb during the presidency of George Walker Bush. Jeb would have been the second son of George Herbert Walker Bush, who was named after his mother Dorothy Weir Walker of Walker’s Point’s father George Herbert Walker, to become president.  Until his concession speech I had no idea his name was “John Ellis Bush.”

It was clear right from the start of the race he tried to distance himself from the Bush name perhaps recognizing Americans are put off by family dynasties running the country. Unfortunately for him word leaked out of private meeting with Manhattan financiers that he told them his top adviser on foreign policy was his brother.  Then a year ago he released his team of 21 foreign policy advisers and 17 of them served his brother. One name on his foreign policy team was a guy named Paul Wolfowitz.

When the subject was brought up Bush said he did get some advice from Wolfowitz. To explain he said that he was just bringing back the people who had the experience and advised the last two Republican presidents.Those of course were his father elected in 1989 and his brother in 2001.  I don’t know about you but that gave me the shivers.

I did not feel much better when he was asked by the infamous Megyn Kelly in May of last year about whether he believed his brother’s attack into Iraq was the right thing to do. His answer was confusing – or at least made to look confusing.  He’d some out the next day and say his misunderstood the question. Later he would say to discuss the issue was “disservice for a lot of people who sacrificed a lot”which meant we were not supposed to question any prior decisions to go to war. 

To me it was not his answered that mattered one way or the other it was that he seemed unprepared for the most obvious question he was going to be asked. Hadn’t he thought about it? Didn’t he talk to his advisers about it?  Perhaps that was the problem. The few people who still think the invasion of Iraq was a good idea are the ones he planned to take with him into the White House.

There’s an interesting article on him when he was at Phillips Academy in Andover.   He had no interest in the politics of the time during the height of the Vietnam era protests 1967 – 1971. He was a well-built six-foot four. He towered over most of his classmates. He was captain of the tennis team. It was fair to say no one gave him any backtalk.

He entered the race the favorite with the connections and the money, $150 million dollars backing him up. During the first couple of debates I’d have to guess his fate was sealed. In retrospect it was because during his youthful days he never encountered a loud mouth bully – he was a product of the country club politeness and gentility where never is heard a discouraging word. When the brass New Yorker Trump unloaded on him he was shocked – he didn’t know how to fight back:  a deer in the headlights frozen in confusion.

The gun was a last gasp. America had a chance to elect a man with well thought out positions backed by the establishment and much money. A man who had been married forty-four years and had nary a black mark on his record other than his relationship to his brother. (Sound like someone else we know.)  It rejected him because an empty-headed bully kicked him and his brother around  when the opposite should have happened.

The downside of a silver spoon birth is missing the rough and tumble of life. Some get over it, like Jeb’s old man or Teddy Roosevelt who went off into combat. Perhaps it is occurring to Americans after the Clinton/Bush/Obama years that those not tested by life in their youth turn out to be failures as presidents.

15 Comments

  1. Curious. Jeb is as effete as Ted Kennedy (aka Edward Moore Kennedy, Milton Academy and Harvard University grad), but with more executive experience as Governor of Florida and is a better driver. Ted also shared a gaggle of advisers with brothers Jack and Bobby. However, Hyannis, Massachusetts has much warmer water for swimming and boating than Walker’s Point, Maine.

  2. JRC,

    As we used to say around here, back in the day….Jeb “took a Dudley.”

  3. Hello Matt, I believe timing is everything in life and Jeb was waiting for a Bus at Broadway when it had already left Andrew Station.

    • JR:

      Your comment reminded me of the statement by your friend John Kerrigan who was extolling his educational background to an out-of-town reporter during the busing days by saying: “I went to Harvard and then to Colombia and under his breath he said and got off at Ashmont.”

  4. Jeb lost because he did not want to win. No ‘fire in the belly’. He was pushed into the race by a camarilla seeking a return to power, that gaggle of neocons that served as his advisers. They are appointees, not elected officials, which explains the expensive incompetence of the campaign. They only connive and whisper to each other. They don’t mix with the people. Voters went for the gusto bypassing the somber, reluctant patrician for the Happy Warrior. And in November, God willing, the electorate will repeat the choice by rejecting the grim determined burglar burrowing down to the vaults of Washington to reprise the Grand Heist of 1993-2001 and will opt again Trump’s spirited jousting and reward him with the catbird’s seat atop the greasy pole..

    • Well said, Tadzio.
      Billary is repulsive.
      As is repeated so often……what has she done?…..nothing except be married to Slick Willie and rides his coattails into relevance,….and then do nothing but lie and doubletalk and show herself as a condescending, power-hungry, money-grubbing hypocrite?

      Desperate times call for desperate measures.

      Let’s make America great again !!!!!

      Open question to all:
      Who do you think Russia, North Korea, China, Syria, Afghanistan, ISIS, illegal immigrants, wannabe immigrants, and domestic/foreign terrorists DO NOT WANT to become the next President of the US?

      I know who.

  5. There is something tweedy and academic about Bush’s appearance and mannerisms. I suspect that this is what conservatives imagine liberals look like. The optics, as the pundits like to say, were very bad. Jeb! was a disaster. I’d love to know which of his highly paid consultants said, “I know. Let’s call him Jeb!”

  6. nc,

    You said it…..”The country wants change.”
    I think that is the reason that someone like Trump could step into the race and be taken seriously. This is history we are witnessing. The utter implosion of the traditional party system.
    The prestige of the position of Commander in Chief has been irreversibly “dumbed down” in this campaign.
    I can’t wait to see who will be running in 2020.

  7. Who was the guy who last week said Jeb would be the nominee?He was polling at 10% in SC. He got 2% in Iowa and 11% in NH. If the Bush family is dishonest what is the Clinton family? Were pardons sold for cash? Foreigners are prohibited from donating to presidential campaigns yet the Saudis give 20 million to the Clinton foundation which is just a purchase of influence and indistinguishable from a direct contribution. The Bush family blundered in many areas but they weren’t thieves. The guy from Arkansas and his cattle futures wife were. 2. The best judge in the sordid history of the Supreme Court ( Dred Scot, Plessey. Koramatsu. Roe ) was Scalia. Thomas voted with him about 80% of the time. Thomas is a giant compared to Breyer, Ginsberg, Kagan and the wise Latina. 3. The GOP is committing suicide with Trump. Cavett described him as a loud misoginist and vulgarian. Trump is just an older, dumber, fatter and coarser version of Romney who couldn’t win. He has no appeal to Latinos and the young. Trump got 27% of the Latino vote. Trump won’t get 20%. He is a guaranteed loser in the general election. Any other Repub would have a shot. The country wants change. Two thirds of the voters say we are heading in the wrong direction. Why nominate a guy with 60% unfavorable.

  8. Jeb Bush, a sissy, whiner and coward never had a chance, but he was too stupid to know, like his brother.

    He’s from the family that gave America the following:

    1. “Read my lips, no new taxes.”

    2. The fabrication of “Weapons of Mass Destruction” as a pretense to spend trillions on a war that unnecessarily killed and maimed thousands of innocent and unsuspecting kids for Cheney/Halliburton oil dollars.

    3. That allowed Cheney to award no-bid contracts to Halliburton for that same phony baloney war so he could stuff his bank account with millions.

    4. That condoned torture which is a war crime banned by international treaties.

    5. That culled approximately 60 thousand from the Florida voter rolls just before the 2000 Presidential election, 88% of whom were African-American.

    6. That gave America Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas who has not asked one question from the bench in 10 years because he claims it’s “discourteous,” when really, it’s his job. As the head of the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC), he kept minority blacks in line and engaged in the biggest promotion fixing scheme in the history of the federal government.

    7. That looked the other way while more than 300,000 veterans died (many on George’s watch) while waiting for medical services.

    8. Had a stupid brother who bragged about “mission accomplished” in Iraq from the deck of an aircraft carrier in May 2003, when some of the worst fighting still lay ahead. More hero soldiers killed for nothing.

    9. Jeb Bush was the Governor of one of the most corrupt states in America.

    That’s only some of the enormous damage accomplished by the Bush family.

    The Bush family damage to America cannot be quantified and was the precedent setting blueprint for the continuation of staggering public corruption and continuing destruction of America by the Obama Administration.

    And now he’ll be skimming millions of dollars from his campaign account because there is no actual or real oversight on the account spending for well connected politicians.

    [email protected]

    • doug,

      Good post.
      If Jeb was the older brother, he probably would have been pushed down our throat in 2000 instead of Dubya. Probably same result with Iraq. Same puppetmasters.
      Plenty off additional conspiracy fodder out there on Bush family.

      • So much more than people think or want to admit.

        The fact that so many millions of Americans are silent and/or afraid only confirms that America is finished.

        When a country loses its courage and everyone know it, the outlook is bad.

        I’m on my way out, not on my way in. It’s too bad that future generations will not have the same America as I once did.

        [email protected]